Samsung, now the world’s largest chipmaker, forecasts record Q1 profit

Samsung has released primarily guidance for its Q1 2018 financial period and the signs are that it will be another blockbuster.

The Korean tech giant’s sales in 2017 were enough to see it unseat Intel as the world’s largest chipmaker based on revenue — ending Intel’s 25-year run at the top — and, while Samsung doesn’t break down its sources of revenue in the guidance, you’d imagine that chips are again the main revenue driver.

Samsung is forecasting that its Q1 profit could hit 15.6 trillion KRW ($14.7 billion) up 19 percent year-on-year and well above the 14.5 trillion that analysts polled by Reuters had predicted. Indeed, that figure would represent a record profit for the first quarter of the financial year for Samsung.

Total sales for the quarter are estimated at 60 trillion KRW (or approximately $56.1 billion), which would be down on the previous quarter (which includes the festive period) but up on the 50.55 trillion total it reported in Q1 2017.

Still though, there’s some concern that the popularity of the iPhone X may be causing slow sales of Samsung’s flagship Galaxy S9 smartphone. Samsung won’t give details on that until it releases its full results for the quarter later in April, but for now it appears that demand for its memory chips is offsetting any disappointment in the consumer smartphone space, despite some concerns around memory price stability.

The Q1 earnings will be Samsung’s first since Jay Y. Lee, vice chairman and the company’s heir apparent, was released from jail after his bribery sentence was suspended. With his father still in hospital following a heart attack in 2014, Bloomberg reports that Lee has been visiting customers and company locations in Europe and North America of late.

Note: The original version of this story has been updated to correct the KRW-USD rate.